Design of an instrument to measure the structural quality of faceted thesauri.

摘要

This study has two main goals: (a) to construct a measuring instrument with which to evaluate the structural quality of faceted thesauri; and (b) to determine the validity and reliability of this measuring instrument. The measuring instrument consists of goals, objectives, and criteria against which to measure the structural quality of faceted thesauri. These goals, objectives, and criteria were derived from the theories of facet analysis, as well as from manuals and guidelines for thesaurus construction. The PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act) model used to design the measuring instrument was derived from evaluation theory and software evaluation theory.; An Item-Objective Congruence Form was used to measure the content validity of the instrument. Three judges were asked to rank the degree to which the criteria in the instrument measure the objectives they were designed to measure. The results obtained from this test confirmed the content validity of the instrument. Fifteen students from the Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, were asked to apply the instrument to the Building Services Thesaurus. The results of these fifteen applications were used to test the construct validity and reliability of the measuring instrument. Principal components factor analysis was used to test the instrument's construct validity, and Cronbach Alpha to test the instrument's reliability. The results obtained from these two tests confirmed that, for the most part, the measuring instrument has both construct validity and reliability.